MRO Image of Mars: Monitoring a New Impact Site in Fortuna Fossae

This impact site is located on the floor of a large fracture within Fortuna Fossae. This site formed sometime between September 2005 and May 2008 and consists of five distinct craters each displaying individual dark-toned ejecta patterns.

The resulting craters indicate that the impactor broke up into five parts prior to its collision with the surface. Craters continue to form on Mars today and repeat imaging of these recent impacts–especially in the color portion–provides information about how impact features change with time. Larger image